Your best F-up?

[Fillmore Farmer]

Here's an interesting thread topic....what is your best accidental result?

We've all done it...forgotten about something on the grill, let something marinate for too long, used the wrong ingredient or gotten something wrong.....and yet, to our surprise, got great results!

Quite often we stumble upon new techniques or new things by accident. Koreans discovered Kim-chi when someone forgot about their rotting (fermented) vegetables....so let's hear it, what's your best F-up result?

Mine happened yesterday...

2 days ago I removed some frozen marinated chicken (uncooked from a party) from the freezer and put it in the frig to thaw. On Tuesday, yesterday, I found the chicken still a bit frosty. I decided to do a split approach to cooking it....smoker first (to smoke/warm) and then the Santa Maria grill to finish...I like the grilled over charcoal finish on chicken.

I put some charcoal and wood in the smoker, got it going about 10 minutes and then slid the rack of chicken into the cabinet. I left the air valve open. It generally takes an hour just to get up to 235F and I wasn't using the Digi-Q to inject air into the firebox so I figured it would take even longer.

I went about getting to work and lost track of time. I dunno, maybe it was an hour or a bit longer...can't say, perhaps even 2 hours...I just don't know.

When I went to check on the smoker, it was up to 350F with lots of great smoke coming from the pipe. I opened the door and found the chicken pretty much cooked! I inserted a temp gauge into a few thick pieces of breast and quickly got readings of 185F+...so I yanked everything. So much for moving things to the grill to finish....

I noticed the breasts looked moist and so, after cooling a bit, I took a bite...and ya know what: DELICIOUS!!!!!!!!

The finish had a bit of crispy to it too, which was delicious...perhaps due to some oil content in the marinade. I always thought lower temps would allow the heat to permeate deeper without drying the outer meat...as well as allow moisture to stay...but no, apparently there is something to this hot & fast notion and especially when it comes to the smoker. Everyone kept telling me that the smoker will make rubbery skin and it's not really ideal for chicken..so slow n' low is not the way to go....but accidentally letting things go to 350F was the ticket!

So funny how accidents often lead to discovering new ways of doing things....

 

[jsperk]

When I first started bbqing I read brisket done at 225. So I cooked them slow for awhile. I was making one for Christmas eve so I put it on at 12 p.m. the night before. So later that night I I wanted raise the temp to a whopping 230 lol. I wake up around 7 or 8 a.m. here I must of hit an extra number cause the fan ran all night and I was out of charcoal an my desired pit temp was set to 2300. It was pretty black and I thought it was ruined. I wrapped in foil pan and put in the oven at the lowest setting (170) until I left for my sisters around 1 or 2 p.m. To this day it was one my best briskets. It was so good.

 

[krex1010]

I'm not that lucky, when I eff up, it always effin sucks.

 

[Fillmore Farmer]

I'm not that lucky, when I eff up, it always effin sucks.

Okay, well let me amend this....then when something goes different then you planned and turns-out to be an improvement or better then expected.

 

[Danny B]

I was following Aaron Franklins beef rib recipe from his book which calls for them to be cooked at 285 for 8-9 hours. Had them on the middle rack of the WSM. Had a brisket on top rack with maverick 732 showing 275-300 so I figured middle rack was cooking a little slower. At 6 hour mark(when Aaron calls for wrapping brisket) I took a long metal skewer to just check on beef ribs and they were probe tender. Took the ribs off to rest while wrapping brisket and in 30 minutes sliced them up and they were the best beef ribs I've ever done. Never touched them for the entire 6 hours. Sometimes less is best.

 

[Fwismoker]

It had to be these pork tenderloins I cooked for Easter, the IT hit 175 plus but turned out to be the best I've made or had.

 

[blazinfire]

It had to be these pork tenderloins I cooked for Easter, the IT hit 175 plus but turned out to be the best I've made or had.

Those look pretty good!

 

[Melissaredhead]

I've ruined 378 briskets but they all made FANTASTIC left overs.
Brisket leftovers are a speciality.

 

[tom b]

that's funny Melissa

 

[tom b]

I have been thinking about this and can't come up with any blunders that actually were worth eating

 

[brandenpro]

Buddy came to town and ended up going to a bar, drank too much the night before the cook. In laws were also in town, staying over and brisket was on the menu all prepped and ready for smoke so I was committed.

Woke up early still drunk got the fire going, got the meat on and over the next 8 hours fell asleep and let fire go completely out in my RF at least twice. The hang over had set in shortly after getting the meat on.

Turned out to be one of my best briskests to date at that time. I learned to not worry about temps, and I learned to cook longer.

 

[zanna5910]

Well here mine goes...

So I had restored a big trailer smoker, put new tel-tru gauges on it, redid the whole outside and all the hardware, and it was ready to get some fire for the first time again. I went with the go big or go home motto, so its maiden voyage would be July 4th block party with all the neighbors. We planned to stay up all night with the cooker, and had a block party over the night as well with the guys.

So I'm going to cook about 10 racks of ribs and 2 packers. I get the fire going, then drop an oven thermometer on the grate to start getting an accurate differential. Little did I know the oven therm was junked up already and already reading really higher than it was. I wanted to rip around 250, but all the old timers wanted 225, the old way. So what the hell, we are going to be up all night anyways, they will be happy. Needless to say, 225 on the gauges really meant about 195-185 on the grates....

So we had been up ALL night, beer flowing. During the night, the ribs cooked for about 9 hours till they were done and bending right. It seemed really odd to me that they wouldn't finish, but I was set thinking I had the pit at 225 the whole time (beer logic). The briskets however, was barely over the stall at about 14 hours, I'm like what the hell is going on??? At this point its like 7-8 am and I need some sleep before I start again for the block party, so I decide to pull the briskets and throw them (wrapped) in the oven to finish. Set the alarm for 190 and go to bed.

About an hour and a half later, my wife comes in and says "Honey, why is the oven beeping, are you cooking something?" I say Yea, how long has it been beeping, "She says, "I dont know, like an hour?!" :shocked:

I jump out of bed with beer goggles on still, rip them out, get burning au jus all over my hands, they are at like 203, and start to rest them.

Needless to say, at about 10 I cut the points off, and get them back in the smoker for the party that afternoon.

Those burnt ends were legendary. The best ever, my neighbors still talk about it. The brisket and ribs were both really good as well. I'm not sure how I pulled that cook off, but I did.

 

[El_coqui]

I've got 2! My first was me wanting to show off for my parents. I had made spare ribs and a butt earlier in the week for them. The ribs were absolutely perfect...the butt was ok but not how I wanted but they killed that too. So full of confidence and having done this enough times before to be comfortable I decided to smoke a brisket. My parents live in VA, and unless you know a Texan that lives there, you are not getting decent brisket anywhere. Their idea of a great brisket was Rudy's :shocked: before I had taken them to Lockhart. I set my pit up and got it running about what I thought was 275 like I had done before and placed my 14 pound brisket in about 8 am. I had planned on having him done around 4 or 5 to let him rest and get all juicy. At around 2 pm I go to check temp and drag my foil out to wrap him up and put my maverick temp probe in to watch while foiled. In goes my digital thermometer and the dang thing reads 205 on the dot! I must've probed 6 or 7 spots in disbelief.... refusing to believe I had cooked that thing in only 6hrs. Even got ice an water to test the pens calibration. I foiled it and set him in a cooler til 6 when my parents got home. To this day that his been one of my top briskets ever!

My second near screw up involved me making 2 briskets overnight for my brother in laws day after the wedding party...wel more like his mom wanted to show off my brisket to the rest of the family. I was up around 7 that Saturday and did not have any sleep or rest for the rest of the day, in fact i wouldnt sleep til about 2 pm or so Sunday afternoon....after the wedding and then the reception I finally got the meat on around 1130?..I played Madden football and drank ridiculous amounts of coffee to keep me up overnight while my family slept. My pit does it hold temp but for about 30 minutes before I have to add more fire to keep it chugging along.....any ways everything went perfect....wrapped in BP this time but time was running short and I was getting tired from having been up all night so I transferred the briskets to oven with the intent of going to lay down for a nap and my wife waking me when they hit 205. That's where it all went wrong :doh: all that wonderful brisket fat had soaked the paper and began dripping on to the gas burners in my oven......ended up with a nasty grease that almost cost me my nights hard work. Lesson learned....put them bad boys on foil or at least a pan or tray to catch the grease.

 

[Pitmaster T]

I can show you my worst....

[ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v342OMn4iAM"]Popdaddy Outakes - Awful Recipe - YouTube[/ame]

 

[BBQchef33]

Here's an interesting thread topic....what is your best accidental result?

UM.. my kids.. :thumb:

 

[Gore]

UM.. my kids.. :thumb:

When the OP said "best F-up?" I don't think it was meant literally. :becky:

 

[Fire Flinger]

I had been working on my own sauce. And I was hoping to get close to duplicating a unique sauce from a local restaurant which I truly like. Around here the typical sauce is sweet and tomato based (Head Country for instance) but this sauce is more tangy with a definite mint presence. I'd been reading about Carolina style mustard sauces so I had been playing with recipes from an old copy of Smoke and Spice hoping to stumble onto the secret. I had progressed to the point of a combo of the 2 styles with appropriate additions (only later did I learn that this is actually called "Memphis style). For whatever reason the Tony's spice bottles seem to be designed with the front label on the back of the bottle and vice versa (the best place to grip it is in the back), so all of ours are in the cabinet with the front facing away. I was looking for cayenne and grabbed cinnamon and had it in the bowl before the aroma hit me. Mixed it up anyhow and now it is a regular component of the sauce.

 

[Happy Hapgood]

The ole reverse spatchcock trick:

Yum! Grilled Ribs!

Grilled Brisket Soup!

Then I joined this place. :bow:

 

[Royalslover]

That is funny Toast but I gotta tell you, there ain't nothing wrong with that chicken!

 

[Happy Hapgood]

That is funny Toast but I gotta tell you, there ain't nothing wrong with that chicken!

It was good. Just found out later it's supposed to be the spine cut. They stack nice and flat. :biggrin1: